CHAPTER XL
ASSOCIATED DORMITORIES.

IN State or other hospitals receiving all classes of patients, a certain number may, without disadvantage, be lodged in dormitories containing from four to six beds, and communicating by means of a partially glazed door with the room of an attendant. As far as this can be done with safety, it is unquestionably the cheapest mode of providing for patients, but it is very easy to carry it to an extent, that will prove most injurious. Two patients, however, as already said, ought never to be placed together in one room; this is dangerous and often demoralizing. A large dormitory with special supervision, is vastly preferable. About one-fourth of all the patients in a State hospital may probably be thus lodged without material disadvantage, and perhaps a twelfth of the whole number of such cases, may really do better in associated dormitories than in single rooms. These last are principally among the timid, who dread being alone at night, and some of the suicidal, who will remain quietly in bed if another person is in the room, but who cannot be trusted without company; although for the latter class, nothing but constant and intelligent watching can be deemed a safe reliance. The great majority of patients would strenuously object to such an arrangement as the associated dormitory, just as much in a hospital as they would in a hotel or boarding house; and most of them regard with especial feeling the privilege of enjoying at times the privacy and quiet of their own rooms; and this feeling should, if possible, be gratified.

It is also convenient to have one or two large rooms, of about the size referred to, in each ward, which if not required or used for this special purpose, will be found particularly convenient in some cases of sever sickness, when it is not expedient to remove a patient from the ward, or when the friends of an individual desire a more spacious apartment than usual, or where a patient has a special attendant lodging in the same room.